Exploiting the naive?
former egyptian geologist and presentday preacher zaghloul al-najjar is currently staying in jordan under the hospitality of the muslim brotherhood group, after he left egypt due to some special political circumstances. in a lecture in jordan, zaghloul reiterated his claims that swiss companies are using camels’ urine to make medicines for treating infertility and heart and liver diseases. many objected to this, demanding for evidences, while others defended him, calling him “the world man”. in a tv interview, zaghloul attacked the protesters, describing them as scum. in response to zaghloul’s claims and with the aim of putting an end to the discussion that took place between his supporters and objectors, the jordanian lawyer zaid omar al-nablusi published a statement in a jordanian newspaper. he was responding to zaghloul al-najjar’s lecture at the jordanian engineers union, saying, “before the judiciary and the jordanian courts, i pledge to pay 100,000 jordanian dinars in cash to the fi rst person, regardless of nationality, who can present concrete evidence of the names and addresses of swiss pharmaceutical companies which, as claimed by zaghloul al-najjar in a television interview, make medicines for infertility, and heart and liver diseases in switzerland using camels’ urine. they must also name the medicine and/or medications. in addition to paying this amount, i will also publish an offi cial apology in my personal name addressed to zaghloul al-najjar and his followers and devotees in large headlines on one full page in the jordanian newspaper al-rai for three days”. he added that his legal undertaking is binding and valid for a full year from the date of publication. today, after almost two months since the publishing of that undertaking, neither zaghloul nor any of his followers have presented any evidences or received the large sum of money by providing the name of the concerned swiss company, if any, even though fi nding this should actually take no more than a minute for any internet researcher. a person, who read the story about zaghloul in amman, asked me to refute the claim. i told him the logical rule is that the evidence should be provided by he who claimed this is true, and that he is obliged to provide proof of his claims, not me. in a move to support lawyer zaid omar alnablusi, i expressed my readiness to pay a similar amount to zaghloul if he proves that there is indeed an existing swiss company that manufactures medicines for infertility, and heart and liver diseases using camels’ urine. the problem does not lie in the presence of such people who make a fool of others and tell such unfounded stories or issues. the man is actually benefi tting materially from the ignorance and naivety of many. the problem lies in the presence of so many ignorant people in our communities who believe such stories and superstitions, and live and move among us. some of them have infl uence and occupy high positions. the fact that their numbers are increasing is really frightening.
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